John Nott

Biography

Bideford, Devon, England, UK

John Nott was born on February 1, 1932, in Bideford, Devon, in Southwest England, son of Richard and Phyllis Nott. He served in the armed forces in Malaysia from 1952 to 1956, but left to study law at Trinity College, Cambridge. From there, he entered law practice. He entered politics when he won a seat in Parliament in the 1966 General Election, as a Conservative MP representing St. Ives. He served as an MP for seventeen years. When Margaret Thatcher led the Conservative Party to victory in the 1979 General Election, John Nott was appointed Secretary of State for Trade. Read more... in that capacity for a year and a half, until he was moved to head the Ministry of Defense in January 1981, replacing Francis Pym. John Nott was Minister of Defense during the 1982 Falklands War. With the outbreak of war, John Nott offered his resignation to the Prime Minister, but Margaret Thatcher refused it, saying he had a bounden duty to stay once British troops were sent into battle. John Nott did not share Margaret Thatcher's enthusiasm for fighting the Falklands War; when Argentina invaded, John Nott reportedly said that once invaded, the Falklands could not be retaken by the British. This was unacceptable to Margaret Thatcher and she overruled him, sending over 25,000 troops to fight the Falklands War. As Defense Minister, John Nott was a member of the War Cabinet, and he oversaw Britain's victory in the Falklands War, the first major military victory for Britain since 1945. After the Falklands War, John Nott left the cabinet and stood down as MP in the 1983 General Election. In 1985, he was elected chairman of the Lazard Brothers Bank. In 2002, he wrote an autobiography titled "Here Today, Gone Tomorrow." The title was inspired by a TV interview in January 1982 in which TV commentator Robin Day suggested that John Nott was a 'here today, gone tomorrow' politician. John Nott angrily stormed off the set, calling that claim "ridiculous."